Respect for your oaths is gone, and I cannot tell whether you think that the gods of old no longer rule or that new ordinances have now been set up for mortals,
[495]
since you are surely aware that you have not kept your oath to me. O right hand of mine, which you often grasped togther with my knees, how profitless was the suppliant grasp upon us of a knave, and how we have been cheated of our hopes!
But come now—for I will share my thoughts with you as a friend
[500]
（yet what benefit can I expect to get from you? Still I will do it, for you will be shown up in an uglier light by my questions）—where am I now to turn? To my father's house, which like my country I betrayed for your sake when I came here? Or to the wretched daughters of Pelias? A fine
[505]
reception they would give me in their house since I killed their father. This is how things stand: to my own kin I have become an enemy, and by my services to you I have made foes of those I need not have harmed. That, doubtless, is why you have made me so happy in the eyes of many Greek women,
[510]
in return for these favors. I, poor wretch, have in you a wonderful and faithful husband if I am to flee the country, sent into exile, deprived of friends, abandoned with my abandoned children. This is splendid praise for a new bridegroom,
[515]
that his children are wandering as beggars, and she who saved him likewise.
O Zeus, why, when you gave to men sure signs of gold that is counterfeit, is there no mark on the human body by which one could identify base men?
Chorus-Leader
[520]
Terrible and hard to heal is the wrath that comes when kin join in conflict with kin.
This text is part of:
Search the Perseus Catalog for:
Table of Contents:
Euripides. Euripides, with an English translation by David Kovacs. Cambridge. Harvard University Press. forthcoming.
The Annenberg CPB/Project provided support for entering this text.
Purchase a copy of this text (not necessarily the same edition) from Amazon.com